Labor has announced plans to punch an $11.4 billion hole in the federal budget by joining with the Greens in the Senate to block a raft of measures the government says are crucial to its fiscal repair task.

The move comes as the generally anti-fossil fuel oriented Greens party declared it would join Labor in opposing the restoration of the federal fuel excise because the government has pledged to spend the extra $2.3 billion it would raise exclusively on roads.

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The crucial revenue measure now appears doomed because it is unlikely to be supported in the new Senate after June with the Palmer United Party and the Australian Motoring Enthusiast Party also opposed.

Labor leader Bill Shorten unveiled the opposition's attitude to 32 provisions of the budget on Tuesday – 20 of which the ALP will oppose. These include the scrapping of the $800 Seniors Supplement for self-funded retirees, which was meant to recover $1059 million over five years from July. Concession card holders will continue to receive the payments beyond June.

Labor will also oppose a government plan to freeze the rates of Family Tax Benefit payments for two years at a saving of more than $2.5 billion over four years. Another change to limit the eligibility to FTB (B) payments to those with with children under six is also to be blocked, denying the Abbott budget repair task another $1.9 billion.

Mr Shorten said Labor had decided to support about $2.8 billion worth of savings including the calculation of superannuation income in eligibility for the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card and the lowering of the income cut-off for Family Tax Benefits (B) from $150,000 a year to $100,000. That will see $1.2 billion less spent on that assistance.

Opposed, however, are the plans to introduce a $7 GP co-payment, the delayed pension eligibility age to 70 by 2035, and new work-for-the-dole requirements on young people slated to save $1.2 billion.

Signalling the fight, Mr Shorten said:

"I will not stand by and let this government make it harder for parents to take sick children to the doctor.

"We will not stand by and watch pensioners be slugged and families be slugged up to $6000 a year."

The government's hopes for much of its budget now turn on the clutch of crossbench senators due to take their seats in the upper house from July.

Central to that is the Palmer United Party, which will control up to four crucial Senate votes needed. The party's head, lower house MP Clive Palmer, is set to announce his position on disputed budget measures on Wednesday.

The government remains privately hopeful that much of the political posturing by opposition and cross-bench figures will eventually give way to a degree of legislative compromise.

Mr Shorten's decision to block so much of the budget has left the ALP open to the charge that Labor is overly negative and has no plan to restore the budget to surplus.

Asked if he would commit to rolling back any savings the government was successful in implementing, Mr Shorten was less definitive.

"I commit to doing my very best to stopping these changes happening. Tony Abbott has a fight on his hands. We didn't ask him to do these crazy ideas, these unfair ideas," he said.

177 comments

Mark,

The charge that you allege can be made against Labor that it is overly negative is risible in the light of the reputation that the Medieval Abbott acquired in Opposition as Dr No. The reality is that almost the entire economics profession, a group not known for being Leftish or favourable to Labor in Australia, have said that there is no budget crisis and that slow, calculated and reasonable action over the next few years, depending upon the state of the economy, will see the budget come back into surplus.

The reality is that, for once, Labor are prepared to reflect the views of the vast majority of Australians that those measures are part of a class war by Abbott on the poor, the young and the old. Bloody good on them I say!!!!!

Commenter

Lesm

Location

Balmain

Date and time

June 25, 2014, 8:14AM

+1

It is not just Labor opposing these budget measures - it is everyone except the LNP (and many of them oppose at least some of the measures). How can Labor be accused of being negative when the entire country knows this is an unfair budget?!?

Commenter

jofek

Date and time

June 25, 2014, 9:00AM

Hear hear !

Commenter

tibstar

Location

robertson

Date and time

June 25, 2014, 9:03AM

shorten showing spine in defending the disadvataged againt the Tory born-to-rulers - willl benefit him and us in the end. SIr Phoney incapable of rational compromise, and completely untrustworthy - Windsor couldn't trust him, quoting the desperate Abbott "`I will do anything , Tony (Windsor) to get that job. The only thing I wouldn't do is to sell my arse'. He won't get much past this Senate

Commenter

rod steiger

Location

toukley

Date and time

June 25, 2014, 9:12AM

Well said Lesm.Overly negative?Get off the pills Mark.The budget is patently unfair,the measures contained within it run counter to the pre election "promises" offered by abbot and his cohorts,and the measures expose the abject lies of hokey,conman and abbot about a fictitious "budget emergency".Furthermore Mr Kenny, abbot wrote the book on negativity - took it to new levels;aren't oppositions are there to "oppose" like tony said?

Commenter

nkelly

Date and time

June 25, 2014, 9:20AM

Even economists and economic commentators within just Fairfax alone have agreed in principle with the wisdom of addressing the deficit, even if not all of them agree with the entirety of the Federal Budget's measures.

Even if (as you claim) "the entire country" oppose the Budget (which it doesn't) yours would still be an argumentum ad populum.

Commenter

Spaniel

Date and time

June 25, 2014, 9:20AM

Interesting that a tape of the former premier --not breaking any law btw-- makes the news here but there's still no examination of the current federal opposition leaders actions in relation to spending union funds he was tasked with protecting.

Agenda. Always.

Commenter

Alex

Location

Finley

Date and time

June 25, 2014, 9:30AM

@Lesm, jofek et al

Makes you wish you'd spent less time cheer leading for boating economic migrants prior to the last election and more time focusing on things that matter.

Hahahaha!

Commenter

Malik the magic sheep

Location

Perth

Date and time

June 25, 2014, 9:37AM

Spaniel, who said we didn't need to address the budget? What's the fancy Latin term for making stuff up?

While we're being smarmy, you have paraphrased and misrepresented my comment. My comment was that "the entire country knows the budget is unfair".

However, I'm happy to qualify my comment regarding everyone but the LNP opposing this budget - everyone except the LNP and their dyed in the wool squaddies and vested interest backers opposes this budget.

Commenter

jofek

Date and time

June 25, 2014, 9:38AM

Spaniel,

Well, well, he knows a bit of Latin, but unfortunately mis-uses it by failing to understand what it means. But first let me address the fraudulent quote he attributes to me. "The entire country" in quotes is attributed to me when in fact no such words appear in my post. Naughty, naughty Spaniel!!!!

Now let's deal with the rather pompous "argumentum ad populum" that I was supposed to have committed. Here is the definition of that term from philosophy.lander.edu "The fallacy of attempting to win popular assent to a conclusion by arousing the feeling and enthusiasms of the multitude."

I was not trying to win popular assent to anything. I was simply pointing out what the population and the economics profession agree on. People can draw their own conclusions. They don't need my help on that. They have indeed done so and they, by a majority of two to one, decided that the budget is a dog and, if democracy means anything at all, that Labor are, at least on this occasion, prepared to act on what the people want. No pat on the head for that little debacle spaniel!!!

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